Even Love can be Found in Hell
by Animajunki1230
Summary: It's very strange how love can work. Especially when it comes to A Certain pink haired Cleric. Serra X Mark. yes you read that right SERRA X MARK! rated T for some language.
1. Chapter 1

Even love can be found in Hell

Chapter 1

It was one of those dismal mornings where one could tell that the day was about to go from bad to worse.

The unfortunate victim of this feeling was a young man with messy brown hair, a light complexion, and sky blue eyes. He was wearing a pair of half moon spectacles on his face, a pair of well worn brown leather boots, a simple pair of white pants, a light green long sleeve tunic, and to top it off a large dark green hooded cloak.

The young man was busy carrying a large pile of books and scrolls that were stacked rather precariously in his hands. _"Easy now"_ he thinks. _"Just a couple of hundred or more feet and you can rest for a sec."_

The young man, however, is so focused on the stack that he doesn't notice the pink haired cleric sneaking up on him.

"Hey Mark! What are you doing?" Shouts the girl as she jumps on Marks back and hugs him.

"AHH!" shouts Mark as he drops his heavy load from the shock. Mark stares at the mess all over the ground and starts shouting. "SERRA! LOOK WHAT YOU'VE DONE!"

Serra lets go and huffs in annoyance "what? I was just coming to see how you were doing. No need to get angry, geez"

Mark can only glare daggers at the cleric, but levels his voice. "What are you doing here anyway? Do you need something from me?"

Serra seems to brighten up and says "no I don't really need anything. I just thought I might brighten your day with my beautiful self that's all."

Mark can only sigh at the girls' remark. He then gets down on all fours and starts to pick up his books "well if you have nothing better to do, help me pick this stuff up then"

Serra looks as if he just asked her to strip. "Pick up those dirty books and ruin my clothes? No thanks."

Mark is seething in anger at this point and can no longer keep his voice level "THEN GO BOTHER SOMEONE ELSE YOU PLAGUE!" he angrily starts to pick up his books again.

Serra only watches in stunned silence for a moment before she starts to get angry at him "Who are you calling a plague! That was very mean!"

She then proceeds to start hitting him in the head with her staff while yelling "you should be calling me many wonderful things instead you jerk!"

Mark throws up his hands to shield his head from more blunt force trauma

"OW! stop that you- OW! I told you- OUCH! THAT'S IT!" Mark launches himself at Serra and grabs her around her waist and pulls her to the ground.

"AHHH!" Yells the cleric as the pair hit the ground. Mark then grabs both her hands and pins her down. "HA! Try hitting me again!" Mark smiles victoriously at winning the little bout.

Serra struggles to get free and yells "Let go of me!" the little scuffle happened to attract attention, and a young man with light brown hair came running from a distance shouting " what's going on over the-" He stops short when he sees the little display in front of him but thinks it is something else entirely.

Mark looks up and notices the position he is in "Uh... Matthew it's not what it-. "But before he can get another word in, Serra kicks him right in between the legs in her struggle "HURK!" Mark rolls over to the side and quickly grabs his injured nether regions.

"Oh!" Matthew winches at the blow that Mark received.

Serra, seeing her chance, gets up quickly and grabs her staff. She sticks her tongue out at Mark and quickly runs away.

Mark, fighting past the pain, yells out to her "YOU BETTER HOPE I DON'T STICK YOU OUT ON THE FRONT LINES!" But quickly shuts up as a fresh wave of pain over takes him.

Matthew, trying very hard not to laugh, comes over and helps Mark up.

Mark, though still in pain, recovers enough to stand.

"Thank you Matthew" the thief only smiles for some reason "well young sir, I thought you were just a book worm that enjoyed simple pleasures, but it would appear that, you too, can have some questionable taste in woman."

Mark looks at Matthew as if he just insulted him "What! That was a misunderstanding! There is no way that-"

Matthew starts walking away with a smile on his face "don't worry my lord; your secret is safe with me."

"Wait! It's nothing like that!" Matthew seems to ignore the helpless tactician and simply keeps walking.

Mark can only watch as he goes. He then starts stamping the ground in frustration _"great! Just what I need! Another problem to add to the quickly growing pile!"_

After a few more seconds of raging, Mark stops and takes some slow deep breaths to calm himself down. When he is done he looks around at his scattered books and scrolls, and only sighs.

"Well" he says putting his hands on his hips "I better pick this all up before anything else happens".

Mark then begins his gathering when, suddenly, he notices something shining on the ground.

Curious, he picks it up and finds that it is a bright silver necklace with a wing shaped pendent on it.

"Strange, who could this belong to?" Matthew? No, he doesn't wear stuff like this.

It suddenly hits him "Serra…" he instantly begins to regret even finding the thing, because he knew he was honor bound to return it to her, and he did not want to meet with the pink haired cleric right now.

Mark only sighs and puts it in his pouch and continues to pick up his books.

Xx several minutes later xX

Mark had managed to get all of his stuff back to his tent and was lying on his cot examining Serra's pendent.

Mark noticed a few things about the pendent when he looked at it closely. First off it was rather worn and looked to be old. Second it also had some letters engraved into it but they where faded so badly that he couldn't make out what they said.

" Hum… strange…" Mark sits up and puts the pendant back in his pouch "well no use wondering about it" Mark stands up and proceeds to go and find Serra.

Upon exiting his tent Mark spies a purple haired young man in the distance and calls out to him "Hey Erk! You got a sec?"

Erk turns to face the tactician and when he gets close proceeds to ask "Yes Mark? What do you need?"

"Do you know where Serra is? I need to see her for a personal reason" best not to tell anybody about the pendent, in case it's a secret.

Erk shakes his head and says "Sorry, no I don't"

Mark only sighs "well if you see her tell her I am looking for her" he then proceeds to continue his search.

Erk shivers at the thought of talking to Serra but another thought crosses his mind "why would anybody seek out that girl? Let alone the tactician…"

Suddenly Matthew appears behind Erk and says "well from what I saw he is looking for her for a romantic reason"

Erk jumps at Matthews's sudden appearance, but quickly recovers "What do you mean 'a romantic reason'?"

"I mean that he must be in love with her, I mean you should have seen it, if I hadn't shown up Serra might be a little less 'holy' right about now"

Erk gave Matthew a look that says he didn't believe a word of it.

Matthew sighs in defeat "alright so maybe it was something else entirely, but think about it. This is the chance of a lifetime!"

Erk raises his eyebrow in question "how so?"

Matthew closes his eyes and lightly laughs "he he… picture it if you would my friend, in a world where Serra leaves us alone because she already has a vassal that loves her unconditionally! And that lucky, or in this case unlucky, somebody is Mark!"

Erk is nodding his head at this point, but quickly comes to a thought "but what about getting Serra to like him back? How are we going to do that?"

Matthew looks at him as if he was stupid "why do we care if she likes him back or not? As long as she is out of my hair I don't care."

"Don't you think that seems rather… cruel?"

"Do you want her to get in the way of your blossoming love with Priscilla?" that clinched it.

Erk nodded his head in agreement "so when do we start?"

Xx Serra xX

The cleric was in her tent taking care of her hair while fuming about her confrontation with the tactician.

"I can't believe that jerk! I, in the goodness of my heart, come along to cheer up his gloomy day and he has the nerve to call me such a nasty name!"

She undoes the braids on her pigtails allowing her hair to come down, and continues to brush.

"_come to think of it we were really close to each other, and he isn't bad looking either"_ Serra slightly blushes at the memory, but starts shaking her head

"Nonononono! What am I even thinking about! He is a jerk and makes me work far too hard! "

A lavender haired girl walks into the tent looking rather tired and worn out.

Serra hears her and turns around "Oh Florina! You will not believe what the tactician did to me today!"

Florina quickly realizes that she isn't going to be able to get away and just sits down, waiting for it to be over.

After a few minutes of over dramatizing the scenario Serra huffs in anger "don't you think that he was rather cruel to me Florina? I mean I just wanted to cheer him up cause he looked depressed!"

Florina seems to think about it for a sec and for the most part figured out the real truth "but… Serra… don't you think it kinda is your fault? I mean… you did surprise him and… you know how he is about his books"

Serra sheepishly looks away and starts twirling her hair "well yeah but… ugh fine, I will grace him with my presence again and allow him the chance to hear me apologize"

Florina only sighs, knowing that this was the best she could do.

"Alright! but first I need to straighten myself up. A lady needs to look good at all times!" Serra then goes back to combing her hair, while Florina begins to undo her armor.

Suddenly Serra screams out "IT'S GONE!"

Florina jumps at Serra's yell and stammers out "wh-whats gone?"

Serra, however, doesn't seem to hear her and begins to franticly look around the tent "where! Where did it go!"

Serra runs out of the tent in desperation.

Florina gives chase and shouts out "Serra!"

Xx Mark xX

Mark had been searching for the cleric for a good ten minutes now and was very much annoyed at his lack of progress

"How…" he starts "in the nine plains of bloody hell does nobody know where that little plague got to!"

Mark takes a deep breath to calm himself down _"I wonder what on Elibe my problem is? I mean I usually don't get this annoyed or angry at such things."_ He thinks about it for a little bit.

"Yeah like when I was with Serra, I mean she wasn't trying to bug me or anything, but I just snapped at her *sigh* I guess I should apologize to her when I find her."

Suddenly, somebody runs past him in haste. Mark takes a look and notices that it is Florina and she looked rather upset about something.

"Hey! Florina! What's wrong?"

The lavender haired girl stops quickly and turns around to see Mark. Though still afraid of men Florina had less trouble talking to Mark then others.

She came over to Mark and quickly asks "Mark! Did you see Serra run past here?"

"No, why is something wrong?"

"Well… I don't really know what the problem is either, but she was very frantic about it"

Mark thinks for a sec and reaches a conclusion "alright you go to the southern end of the camp and I'll go to the western end, and if we don't find her then we go in a circular formation just in case she shows up in the place we were just at, agreed?"

Florina seems slightly confused at first but seems to get the gist of it and nods her head.

"Good now let's go" Mark and Florina both run in there general directions, but after Florina is out of sight Mark stops and runs in the other direction

"_I already know where she is going to be."_

Mark runs to the place where he and Serra fought and finds her there, but when he sees her he jumps behind a tree to hide.

"_Why in the name of Saint Elimine am I hiding from her?"_ Mark peers around the corner of the tree and what he sees stuns him.

Serra is on all fours searching on the ground. Her clothes where dirty and from the looks of things so was her face. But she continued to look around on the ground. On closer inspection Mark sees that Serra is crying.

"Well…" he says to himself quietly "that explains how dirt got on her face."

Mark watches her for a few more seconds and decides to show himself.

"Hey Serra"

Upon hearing a voice Serra quickly gets up and tries to wipe the tears and dirt from her face.

She turns around and greets him "oh hello Mark, what? Come to call me more names?"

Mark could see that the cleric looked absolutely miserable, but when he looks closely he sees that her hair is down. He didn't know why but he thought she looked rather cute right now.

"Uh… no. I was just walking around trying to find you actually"

A look of surprise crosses her face and she asks "why where you looking for me?"

"Well…" Mark reaches into his pouch and pulls out the pendent "I think this is yours."

Serra gasps in surprise but quickly snatches it from his hands.

"Where did you find this?"

Mark continues to rub his neck "well… I found it after our little… fight earlier, it took me a little while but I figured it was yours, so I came to return it."

Serra simply looks at him for a second, but she then does something that Mark had never seen her do before.

She lightly bows to him and says "thank you, and sorry about hitting you earlier" she then starts to run off. Mark is stunned for a moment but he suddenly remembers something

"Oh! Wait Serra!"

Serra stops but she doesn't turn around.

Mark tries to grab at the words in his head "Uh… you see… I'm sorry about calling you a plague earlier, I didn't really mean that. You're actually kinda usefully to have around."

Serra stands for a second longer but she quickly runs off, unknown to Mark the pink haired clerics face is bright red.

Mark watches her run off "well I'll be damned… she can be cute when she wants to be." Unknown to the pair they were being spied on by a very quiet thief.

"He he… this is even better than I could have anticipated!" he continues to laugh and slinks away, devising for his plan.

* * *

><p>So how did you like it ?<p>

This was a pairing that I only just recently thought about, but I never expected it to turn out this well.

at first I had only planed on making it a one shot, but my mind just kept running things through my head and before I knew it, I had this little piece of work typed out

Any comments or feed back is well appreciated

Alright good news! some time after the 21st I should be able to put up chapter 2!


	2. Chapter 2

Even Love can be found In Hell

Chapter 2

It has been several days since Mark returned Serra's necklace, so he believes that that had been the end of his interaction with the cleric.

However, since that day he couldn't seem to get the girl's face out of his mind, and he didn't understand why.

Every time he tried to distract himself and thought he had succeeded, her crying face would always pop back in his head.

It was starting to drive him crazy. "What on Elibe is wrong with me?"

He was pacing around the interior of his tent trying to figure out the reason for his conundrum, but so far had drawn no logical conclusion.

"Ah-ha! I know how to distract myself!"

Mark dashes over to a chest full of books and grabs the first one on top.

"A good book on tactics has never let me down!"

However upon opening the book he reads the title in the index: Bedroom Tactics 101: How to Get Your Partner to Move How You Want.

It takes Mark a few seconds to register what he just read.

"OH DEAR SWEET ELIMINE! WHAT IS THIS AND WHAT IS IT DOING IN MY TENT!"

Mark begins to panic."_Now I can't help but think of this stuff!"_

Suddenly an image of Serra pops in his head and the combined forms of both ideas leave him shocked at himself.

"AHHHHHH! NONONONONO!" Mark holds his head as if he is trying to squeeze the ideas from his mind.

Just outside his tent Matthew and Erk listen in on the noise going on inside.

Matthew is smiling devilishly while laughing, "He he he… I do believe he found our little present."

Erk listens only for a minute before he asks, "Just how is such a book going to get Serra and Mark together?"

Matthew begins explaining, "obviously it's to keep his mind on Serra. It turns out that after their encounter, Mark has begun to develop feelings for her. However he is unaware of his feelings so we have to help him figure that out, understand?"

He nods his head at his idea. "It is much easier to expound on feelings that already exist rather than try to create them from scratch."

Erk is shaking his head in disagreement. "I don't really think that this will help him and Serra get together."

Matthew turns to Erk with a look of slight annoyance.

"Hey, the book was your idea in the first place, so you don't get the right to complain about the method."

Erk throws up his hands in defense. "I only mentioned the book as a joke! I didn't think you would actually use it in such a way!"

Matthew holds up his hand to silence the mage.

"Shh, this is about to get interesting."

Erk looks around the corner of the tent and sees Serra walking toward the noisy tent.

Mark is still trying to figure what to do with the book when Serra suddenly bursts through the tent.

"HELLO THERE!" shouts the Cleric with a smile on her face.

"AHHH!" Mark throws the book into his chest and slams the lid shut.

Mark quickly turns around and stammers out "Se-Serra! What a surprise! Wh-What do you want?"

Serra however quickly takes an interest in what just happened.

"Oh? And what may I ask, did you just do?"

Serra is grinning wickedly at this point.

"Nothing you need concern yourself with! Now what do you need?" Mark is desperately trying to keep himself calm in hopes that the cleric wouldn't investigate further.

Serra takes another look at the closed chest, but decides to let it drop… for the moment.

"Well if you really must know, you see the weirdest thing happened this morning" She pulls out a book and shows it to Mark. "I found this in with my clothes!"

Mark examines the book "The Philosophical Tactics of War? What is this doing in your tent?"

Serra only shrugs "not sure, but in my grace and charitable attitude, I decided to give this to you. Am I not wonderful?"

Mark looks at her with surprise and confusion on his face. "Wait… your giving this to me?"

Serra huffs at him "Of course I am! Do I look like I read this stuff? Now hurry up and take it" Serra presses it into his open palms.

Mark looks down at the book in his hands. "Well… I… Thank you Serra."

But when he looks around for Serra he sees that she is already opening his chest.

"AH! Hey!" he throws the book on his cot and runs at the cleric.

Serra is one step ahead of him and grabs the book on top and hops out of the way, causing Mark to collide into the open chest.

Serra is holding the book in one hand and is giving the victory sign with her other hand. "HA! You can't hide things from me!"

Mark is rubbing his face and is scowling at her "Why you little-!"

Serra is laughing victoriously and starts to run out the tent.

"OH NO YOU DON'T!" Mark leaps at her and grabs her by the foot, causing Serra to fall flat on her face.

"OW!" Serra yelps as she hits the ground.

On impact she lets go of the book.

When Mark sees this he pounces on the book, believing himself the victor.

However Serra recovers quickly and jumps on top of Mark, attempting to take the book from him.

"LET ME SEE IT!"

"THIS IS NOT FOR CHILDREN'S EYES!"

Mark struggles to keep the book out of her grasp and is holding it just out of her reach.

Mark and Serra continue to wrestle for a few more minutes, when suddenly a knight with light brown hair and wearing green armor comes through the tent opening.

"Mark! I require your wisdom to-"what he sees silences him.

Serra is sitting on top of Mark with her dress rather messed up and breathing heavily. Mark was also in the same shape except he is underneath her.

There is a few seconds of awkward silence.

"Eh he he… sorry about that… I'll let you get back to it then." The Knight's face is a very bright red as he closes the tent flap.

A few seconds later the pair hears "KENT! YOU WON"T BELIVE WHAT I JUST SAW!"

"OH HELL NO! STOP RIGHT THERE SAIN!" Mark quickly pushes Serra off and runs after him, dropping the book on his way out.

"Ow!" Serra falls on her butt and starts to grumble.

"Well, that was rude." Serra is rubbing her busted backside as she gets up, when she suddenly notices the forgotten book.

A grin starts to slide across her face. "Ha! Told you that you can't keep it from me!"

However when she picks it up, the title of the book surprises her.

What Is Love and How to Understand It.

Serra's eyes scan the title a few more times to make sure she read it right. After a few more seconds of examination, her face starts to blush but she also smiles as well.

"Wow… I didn't know he felt this way, he must be too shy to admit it"

Serra begins to stroke her chin in thought. "I wonder who he likes?"

Serra smiles and puts the book in her pouch. "Well I guess I better find out!"

The cleric begins her search by opening Mark's chest of books.

She starts to scrounge around in the chest, pulling books and scrolls and haphazardly throwing them aside, trying to find some kind of indicator to Marks supposed hidden love.

After completely messing up the contents of the chest, Serra then begins to look around the tent itself for any clues.

"Now if I had a secret love, where would I hide the evidence?"

She thinks about it for a moment, when it suddenly hits her.

"Since it must be valuable it must be hidden under his bed!"

The cleric gets on all fours and looks under Mark's bed.

She finds a large amount of scrolls neatly rolled and tied together.

"Bingo!" She grabs the large pile and begins to untie them.

But before she can undo the knot, a very worn out and angry looking Mark walks back into the tent grumbling to himself.

"Great, just great. Now that Sain has totally misunderstood, the whole camp is gonna think I like to assault-"

Before he can finish his thought, his attention falls on the scattered books and scrolls all over the ground.

He also notices Serra holding some very important looking documents.

Marks anger quickly boils into a fiery rage.

"SERRA! WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING!"

Serra, not knowing that he had come back, jumped at the sound of his angry voice.

"Eep!" She quickly throws the scrolls back under the bed and stands back up in haste.

She stammers to get a response out. "Uh… um… well…you see… I was… looking for something! Yeah that's it!"

Mark only looks at her, knowing that this was an obvious lie.

"No you're not; you're going through my stuff trying to find out something about me. Now go, before I decide to call Hector and have him drag you out of here."

Unknown to Mark, he said this with a little more venom in his voice then he had meant to.

Serra is rather upset at the anger in his voice and curtly replies as such. "Well fine! I was just trying to know something else about you, you know!"

Serra quickly storms out of the tent, but not before she hits him in the back of the head with her staff.

"OW! You little-!"

He attempts to grab her, but she is already long gone.

After a few seconds of silence, Mark angrily kicks a book across the tent.

However, he kicked the book with such force that it hit the chest and flew back to smash him in the face.

Marks glasses break as the book collides into his face, which in turn draws blood.

"OW! DAMN IT!"

Mark applies pressure to the wound to stem the bleeding. Thankfully the cut is shallow and Mark quickly finds the first aid kit.

After he patches himself up, he goes and sits on his bed, contemplating what just transpired in the last ten minutes.

" Well… this day has perhaps been the worst I have had in a while."

"But of course, the fault does lie with me this time again."

Mark simply does not understand why he keeps getting so touchy with the Cleric recently or why he simply can't seem to help but think about her.

"I guess I had better apologize to her the next time I see her, but first I better clean up this mess and try to get a new pair of glasses."

As Mark is cleaning up the mess, he sees the book that he got from the cleric on his bed.

He picks it up and sighs, "Yeah… I really need to apologize to her"

He examines the book for a few more seconds and places it on his pillow, he grins lightly as he goes back to cleaning.

Just outside of the tent Matthew and Erk had listened to the entire scuffle.

Matthew was grinning like a child while Erk was seriously thinking that this was not turning out too well.

"He he… things were kinda tense there but I think we have made progress."

Erk looks at Matthew in shock. "You call that progress? She just smacked him in the head!"

Matthew turns to the mage "How many times must I tell you? We don't care if she likes him back or not, as long as he is the one to fall for her. Which I must say is happening much faster than I thought it would."

Erk only shakes his head. "Now Matthew… I may not be the best when it comes to feelings of love, but I do think it should be both ways, else it is just cruel and unusual punishment for Mark."

Matthew rolls his eyes at the mage's suggestion, but gives in.

"Fine… we'll do it where both try to fall for each other, happy? But I guess you already planned for it, seeing as how you put that book in Serra's tent."

Erk looks at the thief in confusion

"Wait… you mean, you didn't?"

Matthew gives Erk the same look

"I thought you did."

The pair looks at each other for a few more seconds trying to figure it out.

The two of them simply come to the agreement that it was "Divine luck" and leave it at that.

Unknown to the pair that they were being spied upon by a woman wearing a light blue tunic and has her long green hair tied into a ponytail.

She was shaking her head but smiling all the same. "Seriously…" She then quickly departs.

* * *

><p>Well there we go people! Chapter 2!<p>

took me a little while to find the right feel for this but even then I don't think I did to bad

Enter Lyn! we all know who it is...

might take me a little bit to get the next one up


	3. Chapter 3

Even Love can be found in Hell

Chapter 3

It has been nearly 2 weeks since Serra and Mark had fought in the tent.

And, much to Mark's dismay; Serra was avoiding him like the plague.

Every time Mark managed to find the cleric, she would take off in the other direction.

This in turn, was really beginning to annoy him. And to add to his problems, Mark could not see due to his broken glasses, so he was having a hard time making strategies for Eliwood as well.

Unfortunately, that wasn't the only problem that was happening.

"All right. Now the main strategy here is to send the front line units in hard and fast, followed by support from the long range units. And then when the enemy seeks to retreat, the mounted and flying units will flank them, Agreed?"

Everybody in the room nods in agreement. A large man in blue armor and wielding a large ax decides to speak up." Yes the plan is sound, however… Mark you do realize your talking to a chair right?"

Mark squints his eyes to see "ah I do believe you are right Lord Hector .forgive me, I thought I was talking to you"

Hector's temper quickly flares up" why you-!"

Eliwood holds up his hand to calm the lord "Peace Hector, and Mark you really shouldn't gouda him like that"

Mark sighs "true enough. forgive me lord Hector, I should not take my frustration out on you"

Hector's temper dissipates quickly "bah, there is no harm done"

Eliwood nods his head"Very good. Also… Mark… Hector does have a point. perhaps you should try to get a new pair of glasses before we continue on with our battles." The young Red haired noble suggests to his friend.

Mark only sighs in response "true…. But for the time being I need to do what I can, and I will not let a lack of glasses hamper our progress."

Eliwood only smiles at the tacticians determination "very well then Mark, I understand."

Mark nods his head "good, now would you please direct me to my tent? I can't see ten feet in front of me right now."

The sound of a suppressed giggle can be heard. Mark rounds on the source of the noise "hey! Hush up Lyn! You know I can't see very far without my glasses!"

A young woman wearing a light blue tunic and has her dark green hair in a pony tail is standing off to Marks right." Forgive me Mark, I could not help myself"

She is still smiling about her friends predicament "Tsk …" Mark only clicks his tongue and walks out of the tent. "Oh! Wait up Mark!" Lyn quickly follows after him.

Eliwood and Hector watch the entry way for a few more seconds before the blue haired lord breaks the silence. "Is it just me, or has he been more irritable for the past few weeks?" "Yes I believe so Hector." Hector only sighs "no reason to get his pants in a wad just cause his glasses broke" Eliwood however seems to be lost in thought. "I wonder if that's all there is to it…"

Outside Lyn catches up with the annoyed tactician. After a few minutes of walking with him, Lyn decides to break the silence. "So tell me… what's wrong?"

Mark quickly replies "Nothing is wrong Lyn. I just can't see."

Unknown to the Tactician, Lyn is shaking her head "That's not all there is to it Mark. I know you better than most people, and you are far too annoyed for this to be about your glasses. Now tell me, what's wrong?"

Mark sighs, knowing that he couldn't lie to his best friend for long. "Fine… I don't know why I bother trying to hide my problems from you… To sum the problem up, I am trying to apologize to somebody, but she keeps running from me."

Lyn smiles lightly "you must be talking about Serra." Marks face is written in shock.

He tries to stutter out some response "WH-what? Who said anything about Serra?"

Lyn only giggles. "Spot on."

Mark, realizing his mistake, smacks his forehead. "Damn it!...fine… yes this is about Serra. I said some things that I did not mean and… well… you see the result."

Mark sighs once again. Lyn lightly pats her friend on the back "hey come on. It's not like your situation is hopeless"

Mark gives her a look that says 'yeah right'. Lyn pats him on the back again "come now, trust me on this Mark. I will even help you if that is what you desire"

Mark looks to his friend "truly? You would help me with this?" Lyn smiles warmly at her friend "you create flawless strategies every battle and are helping us to strike down that monster Nergal. The least we can do is help you with the small stuff"

Mark was slightly surprised to hear this. "Does… everyone feel that way about me?" Lyn nods her head. "ah! We are here."

The strategist and the plainswoman had been so busy talking that they had almost past Marks tent. "Well this has been an interesting conversation Lyn, but I must get ready to go into town later so that I may acquire new glasses. So until then I bid you farewell for now" Mark gives her a small bow and enters his tent.

Lyn waves her friend off. However, before she even takes a step she notices something pink out of the corner of her eye.

She turns to see what it is, and sees 2 pink pig tails sprouting from both sides of a tree. The temptation to laugh is almost too strong for the plainswoman, but she manages to suppress herself.

She decides to observe the tree for a few minutes, waiting to see what happens next. After nothing seems to happen Lyn decides to break the silence "Serra… what are you doing?"

"Urk!" the Cleric slowly appears from her hiding spot "impressive Milady, how did you know I was here?"

Lyn gives a weary sigh "let's just say you stand out in certain ways… anyway what are you doing hiding?"

Serra suddenly looks rather nervous "um… well… you see…" Lyn just stares at her. "uuuuh… Oh fine! I came here to apologize to Mark, there happy?"

Lyn raises her eyebrows in a questioning ark "why?"

Serra averts her gaze from Lyn "well… you know how Mark hasn't been wearing his glasses for a few weeks now right?"

Lyn nods her head "yeah" Lyn knew about that already. Mark had explained it to her with a lot of embarrassment, and being the true friend that she was, laughed at him.

"Well… I came to apologize about his glasses" she looks at Lyn when she says this.

Lyn is now very confused "why?"

Serra averts her eyes to the ground again "cause I broke them. He and I got in a fight two weeks ago, and in a fit of anger I hit him in the head with my staff"

Lyn could only scratch her head in confusion. Until she suddenly realizes just where this is going.

"I… I tried to apologize many times now, but every time I see him he starts coming at me with anger in his eyes, and I run away."

Lyn is seriously trying not to laugh at this point. She knew that what Serra had seen was not anger in Marks eye's, but him trying to see what he was looking at. It was almost too much for the plainswoman.

"And now you know the whole story. Now if you will excuse me, I am going to find the right time to apologize to him" Serra then goes back behind the tree.

Lyn only smiles and begins to walk away again. Before she goes another ten paces however she stops in her tracks and a devious smile begins to form on her lips.

Lyn turns around and calls out to Serra in an oh-so-sweet voice "Oh_ Serra…_"

Serra pokes her head out from the tree again "yes Milady?"

Lyn walks over to the tree and starts to drag Serra out from her hiding spot. "Hey! What are you doing?" Serra desperately tries to grab onto something to hold herself down but she is quickly dragged out of her spot.

"I have an idea Serra, and it should allow you to apologize." Serra stops struggling and listens to Lyn.

Lyn stops and let's go of Serra "I see that I have your attention now. All right here is my plan, Mark is going to go into town sometime this evening to get a new pair of glasses and you are going to help him, and while you're both in town you can find the opportunity to apologize, understand?"

Serra bobs her head furiously in understanding.

"Good girl, now go get ready as I work a few more details into this plan."

Serra quickly dashes past Lyn to get ready.

Lyn, however, stays right where she is. After a few minutes of silence Lyn suddenly kicks a bucket in the direction of a bush.

On contact a loud yell can be heard "OUCH!" Lyn leaps into the bush and pulls out a squirming Erk.

Erk stops his squirming and looks up at Lyn _"Ohhhhh, I'm screwed now"_ "ummm, hello Lady Lyndis nice day today isn't it?"

Lyn only looks down at Erk with a devilish smile on her face "spare me the pleasantries Erk, now where is Matthew?"

Erk averts his gaze from her evil eye's "Ma-Matthew? I haven't seen him all da-"

Before he gets another word in, Lyn begins to drive her foot into his abdomen. She just so happened to be wearing heels today.

"OH SWEET SAINT ELIMINE! MERCY MILADY! MERCY! HE'S IN THAT TREE OVER THERE!"

Matthew pokes his head out from the branches and yells at Erk "you ratted me out you sonuvabitch!"

Before Matthew could get another word in, the same bucket that hit Erk smashes into Matthews face, causing him to fall from the tree.

He just so happened to rebound on every tree branch on the way down. " AH! EH! OH! AH! EH! OW! OH! AH! EH! AH! *crash* ARGH!"

By the time Matthew recovers enough to see straight, Lyn is already standing over him with her heel hanging over his abdomen.

Poor Erk had simply been dragged along.

Matthew is suddenly feeling very nervous "um….he he… What can I do for you today milady?"

Lyn stares down at Matthew with an evil smile on her face "I know what you two have been up to recently, trying to get Mark to fall in love with Serra and all that. But you are going about it rather badly."

She hauls Erk to his feet and does the same for Matthew.

" at the rate you two are going, it will be a rather strained relationship at best, so from here on out, you both are going to follow **My** orders, Understood?" Both Matthew and Erk nod their heads quickly in unison. "Good. Now here is the plan…"

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><p>sorry it took so long to get this up<p>

in all honesty I had forgot about it until I went over my documents

working on chapter 4 now


	4. Chapter 4

Hey all! sorry I'm late! My only excuse is real life got in the way! But are you surprised to find that the story isn't dead? So am I! well, without further delay, here is chapter 4 in Even love can be found in hell!

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><p>Even Love can be found in Hell<p>

Chapter 4

Mark was standing next to a rather large chestnut brown horse, tapping his foot impatiently. He begins talking in a mocking girly voice _"you need somebody to guide you to the village since you're as blind as a post and as dumb as one to boot._ Bah… damn you Lyn, I don't need a frikken guide. I can handle going to a village by myself thank you very much!"

Mark turns around and attempts to jump on the horse, however due to the large size of the horse, Mark only manages to get his arms up before he slides back down. Mark is now very peeved "and why the hell did she give me such a huge horse! Elimine damn her thinking!" Mark simply sits down on the ground in defeat and fumes.

Unknown to him was that Lyn and Serra where off in the trees watching him fume and rant. Serra was looking nervous "I… I think I may have changed my mind Milady. I don't think I like this idea anymore"

Lyn facepalms in frustration "we have been standing here for over 30 minutes now, waiting for you to feel ready, and now you say you wanna back out?"

Serra begins to fidget "hey! You're not the one who has to walk out there when he's in a rage! Plus I think I here Florina calling me…"

Serra only gets two steps away before she feels Lyn grab her collar and yank her back, and Lyn did not have a happy face. " Not gonna happen. Now you get out there right now and get on with it, or I strip you naked and **still** make you go out there, your choice."

Serra wasn't sure if Lyn would do it, but she wasn't going to take her chances. Serra pulls away from Lyns grip and takes a deep breath "alright… no need to worry Serra… just act totally natural and it should all be ok."

Suddenly Mark turns around and Serra sees his face, and he looked furious. "_What is taking so damn long!"_

Serra loses her nerve and runs back in the cover of the forest next to Lyn " I can't do it! I know he's gonna yell at me…"

suddenly, Serra feels a cold chill run down her spine. When she turns around, she sees Lyn with her hands on her sword ready to cut her clothes to ribbons

"Eep!" Forgetting her fear of Mark, Serra runs as fast as she can in Marks direction; however she was not looking in that direction, instead she was looking behind her to make sure Lyn wasn't giving chase.

Mark heard a noise behind him and turned to see a… blob running at him. "well it's about time you showed u-" before he could finish that statement, Serra, still not paying attention, collides into him and the pair fall to the ground in a tangled heap.

"YIKES!"

"AHHHHH!"

Mark and Serra are struggling to get up, but the pair keeps falling over each other in confusion. Mark suddenly grabs Serra by her shoulders "STOP MOVING!" Serra freezes, not at being yelled at, but at his hands on her shoulders. Mark, finally having a good view of who he is looking at, suddenly lets go of her in surprise "Se-Serra?" Serra quickly gets up and dusts herself off, not even looking in Marks direction "H-Hi there Ma-Ma-Ma-Ma-Mark! Fancy running into you here! He he… eh…" She laughs a very nervous laugh.

Mark gets up and looks away from her as well "yeah… uh yeah… funny that…" an awkward silence follows.

Quite a few minutes had gone by before anything actually happened

"so uh…"

"well uh…"

the pair had tried to talk at the same time, but had stopped at the same time as well.

They simultaneously continue "oh sorry, you first. No you first, I insist. Stop doing that… sugar cookies!"

the pair stop talking after that and think the exact same thing _"wow, that was weird"_ while all of this was going on, Lyn had been grating her fingernails against a tree while silently hissing "_Get on with it!_"

Both Mark and Serra had been feeling something very vicious on their backs so they quickly broke the silence "so uh… Serra…what are you doing here?" Serra lightly jolted at this and started to stutter "Ha! Ha ha… funny you should mention that. You see…um… Milady Lyn called me up to uh… help her… with something… but apparently it wasn't going very well and uh…said that she had an appointment with you. So, since she couldn't make it, I went in her place! Ha! Ha ha…"

Mark could tell that the girl was making something about this story up, but didn't press the issue "I…see. Soooooooo… should we… you know… get going? We don't have a lot of time in the day"

Serra was all too eager to get going "yes! Of course! Let's go!" Much to Marks amusement, he watched her try to get on the large horse and fail as badly as he did.

Serra began to rant "why in the name of the holy light did you get such a huge horse! I didn't even know we had such a huge horse here!"

Mark only shrugged his shoulders "I wasn't the one who picked it out, and as for why we have such a big horse, I think that was due to Oswin saying that we didn't have stout enough horses to carry a General of his impressive… constitution"

both Serra and Mark lightly laughed trying to imagine Oswin riding into battle on a horse, because as far as Mark knew, the large man didn't have a lot in the way of horseback riding.

After she got done laughing, Serra motioned for Mark to do… something. Mark gave her a confused look "sorry, I don't know what that means"

Serra was annoyed and started to stamp on the ground "help me up! I can't get up by myself!"

"Ah, Ok then._ You could try asking nicely…"_ Mark lightly mumbles to himself as he tries to figure out how to do this.

After a few more minutes of contemplating, he sighs and looks at Serra "ok, here how this is going to work. I pick you up and you get on the horse, then you help me up, Ok?"

Serra waves her hand at him "yes, yes now come on already!" Mark only sighed.

Serra stood next to the horse and waited for him to start… whatever it was that he was going to do. She suddenly felt some arms around her waist and was hoisted up, causing her to flail her arms wildly "Wah! Wa wa wa wa!"

" Stop moving and grab the damned saddle! I can't hold you up forever!"

Serra, not really hearing him, lunged forward, causing Mark to lose his balance. He quickly tried to right himself, but only ended up causing them both to fall backward. Lyn watched the little display with an annoyed expression, while Matthew and Erk who were hiding in the bushes started to laugh at the silly display.

Serra was sitting upright on Marks chest and turned around to look at him "you're not really strong, are you?"

Mark quickly snapped at her "Who asked ya!"

Serra quickly gets off of him and huffs "You don't have to get snippy… geez…"

Mark started to fume internally _'you're the one who asked me to do it!'_

Meanwhile, in the bushes, Matthew leans out and whispers to Lyn "Um… Milday… Not that I'm one to question your Ideas… But… why did you give him such a huge horse?"

Lyn doesn't even turn around to answer the question "had to. I know Mark all too well, he would have simply ignored my urging for a guide and went into town himself. So, I had to get him a horse that he couldn't mount easily. Plus, it brings them a little closer together"

Matthew grinned "I see…"

Lyn turned toward Them "And what are you two still doing here anyway? Get to town! Stage two of this plan is going to start there!"

Matthew and Erk Quickly Bolt up and salute "Yes Ma'me!" They quickly scrabble away with Lyn huffing at them.

She went back to watching her friend.

Suddenly the sound of a young voice called out to Mark and Serra "ah! Milord Mark! I see you have Chestnut!" Both of them look over to see a knight in red armor walking toward them.

Mark looked back at the knight "Ah, Kent, nice to see you! Are you talking about this horse here?" The green clothed man pointed at the unusual large horse.

Kent nodded his head "yes! I was wondering where he got to!"

Serra stared at Chestnut "what do you need him for?"

"Sir Oswin was going to try to risk another horseback riding lesson today"

Mark scratched his chin in amusement "I see… hopefully this attempt goes better then the last two eh?"

Kent lightly chuckled "One can only hope… he does tend to be rather stubborn about it"

Mark shrugged his shoulders. Serra, feeling that she was being forgotten, piped up "Well, that's good an all, but We need a horse to get into town"

Kent nodded his head in understanding "Ah, very well then. If you both would be so kind as to wait here, I will switch out the horses for you. Chestnut! Come here!" Kent walked over and took the horse by the reigns.

After he left with the horse, Serra and Mark stood in an awkward silence with neither one saying anything to the other.

Mark kept taking glances over at where Kent had gone _'please hurry…'_

Serra was taking glances over where Lady Lyn was _'Please hurry Kent…'_ However, the direction that they needed to look was across from the other, so they inadvertently looked each other in the eyes once or twice. This only caused them both to be more nervous and bothered by there current situation.

After what felt like an eternity, Kent eventually made his way back with a much more manageable horse. "here you go"

Mark quickly took the reins from his hands "ah! Yes! Thank you Kent! I'll see you sometime later then!" Kent Bowed and left.

Mark lead the horse to the road and motioned for Serra "alright, do you want me to try to lift you up again? Or can you manage?" Serra gave him a slightly annoyed look before she hopped up the side of the horse with ease. Mark shrugged his shoulders "I see you don't need help then." Mark leaped up and manged to pull himself up on this horse, albeit with a little of Serra's help of course, and took the reigns. "Lets get going then..."


	5. Chapter 5

Urgent announcement!

Hey fans loyal and somewhat new! This is animajunki here!

Now where you might have been hoping to see a new update To pale roots or love and hell, instead you get this ugly little blurb about how my life currently sucks.

I'm not sure how many of you looked at my profile, but I put up the news there, but since not many people check out a profile, I'll tell you in the chapters.

I've lost my computer.

It died on me a week back, and after saving enough money, I paid a guy to try to fix it. He told me he would try, but that he wouldn't promise anything. Turns out, he couldn't. so I asked him to try get the files off of my computer. I thought that after paying the punk 75 bucks, he could at least do that much. Turns out he couldn't.

So, Pale Roots and Love and Hell will not be updated for a very long time, if ever.

I have practically lost the will to write right now.

I had at least a new chapter for love and hell ready, and I had over 52 pages of text ready for Pale roots, all of that gone in a flash.

The only silver lining I can see in this whole situation is that the guy gave me at least half of my cash back.

That and I bought a new computer.

Soooooooo… sorry about telling you so late, but until either the will comes back to write or I can pull my stories off of my old computer, Both stories are on current Hiatus.

From, Animajunki123


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